Thursday, June 30, 2011

"All this time I swore I'd never be like my old man......what the hey, it's time to face exactly who I am."

- From the song "Hate to Feel" by Alice In Chains

I've cried exactly three times in my adult life. The first, when I saw my own father break down (the one and only time he ever has cried as far as I know of) while delivering his Mother's eulogy.

The second, was several years later as I carried my Maternal Grandmother's casket from the church at her funeral as a pallbearer.

The third time was last night...from watching a reality TV show.

Well, technically I had tears come unbidden to my eyes for which I tried to blink back and suppress as much as possible, whereas in the first two instances, I didn't even bother trying to hold it back, but still...I've never thought that watching a reality TV show would ever ever cause such a strong emotional reaction in myself.

I began recording this show on the DVR about a year ago after having found myself in a hospital bed with nothing to do for hours other than channel surf. I came across a Gene Simmon's Family Jewels marathon and proceeded to watch about 4 hours of episodes in a single sitting. While I was never a huge KISS fan, I found the show to be quite entertaining...especially when viewed through the lens of understanding social and relationship dynamics gained from studying this popular "interwebz manosphere fad" called "Game."

Simmons is the quintessential "Alpha" in every sense of the word and you can see many game concepts play out in the reality show.

But that's not why I'm writing this post.

The new season for this show began three weeks ago, and it began with the first episode in which Simmon's 18 year old daughter Sophie, leaves the home to go off to college and Gene's Girlfriend, Shannon Tweed, starts experiencing a bad case of empty nest syndrome. She reaches a breaking point when a supposed dinner in which both their kids were going to be at home, Gene missed because he was at a business dinner with the usual assortment of groupie women who seem to hang off of him whenever he makes a public appearance.

The ladies end up posting their photos with the KISS Rock star on the internet, and Shannon is greatly upset that instead of coming home for dinner with their visiting kids, he's out in public with young hot women hanging all over him.

If Athol were to diagnose this, I'm sure he'd point out that Gene was showing too much Alpha traits and not enough Beta traits to build comfort in his relationship with the former Playboy Playmate. Gene is already a multi-millionaire. He's in a place where he shouldn't have to prioritize business meetings over important, personal family moments. But I digress...

Shannon ends up moving out of there house into a hotel, and Gene gets shellshocked when the kids take their mother's side, and he begins to attend therapy by episode 2 of the season.

The show was no longer entertaining me. At this point, I considered deprogramming it from my DVR, as it appeared to begin to follow the typical mainstream media script of Man Bad/Woman Great.

It was like watching the "breaking of the Alpha" as he falls into the depths of oneitis depression. It was worse watching his therapy sessions with a female therapist.

By the end of the third episode, he manages to woo Shannon back home with promises of changing..blah blah blah.

The ultimate female fantasy. The taming of the Alpha that is desired by thousands of young women the world over.

At this point, I suspect that the entire "break up" and "get back together" is just a scripted "Reality" to drive ratings. Hell, I'm almost certain it was scripted as I started googling this morning and discovered that they made appearances on female daytime talk shows and had arguments with Shannon storming off the set in tears. Talk about calculated rating's stunts.

But in my mind, this week's episode offered redemption for the Vagenda-driven rating's stunt drama of the first three episodes. Even if the overall direction of this most recent episode was scripted, there is no way some of the reactions and dialog from this latest could have been faked, rehearsed or acted. It was as real as any "reality" show could be.

You can watch the episode for yourself here before reading the rest of this post, which, naturally, contains spoilers: http://bcove.me/02gnesdt

For those who don't know much about Gene Simmons, he was born in Haifa, Israel, and came to America with his mother when he was only a young boy of about 9 or 10. Given his tremendous success as a Rock Star and a businessman (and now reality show star) his hometown wanted to present him with an award of some sort. Shannon decided it was the perfect opportunity to make Gene deal with his personal Father-abandonment related issues.

So Shannon arranges a surprise meeting with Gene's family members, who he purportedly did not know even existed.

According to the show, Gene had always been under the assumption that his Father abandoned he and his Mother, which is why they came to America when he was still a young boy. He used that as his personal motivation and drive to succeed in life. He admits that his thoughts of the abandonment drove him his entire life to prove that he did not need his Father for anything. As far as he was concerned, his Father was dead to him, he wanted nothing to do with him...so much so that he forbade his Mother from talking to him about his Father. He never visited or talked to his Father on the phone. He only wrote a single, short letter to his Father when he was younger, and he never received a response. His Father passed away in 2002.

Gene apparently didn't have an idea that he even had a half brother and three half sisters and a bunch of nieces and nephews still living in Haifa. I would suspect that deep down, he knew somehow that he had relatives, but he kept that knowledge suppressed because he did not want to deal with his Father-abandonment issues.

Nevertheless, when Shannon and Nick (his son) accompany Gene to a restaurant and Shannon introduces him to his half-brother Jacob and his three sisters, Gene's reaction is as real as it gets. As the show progressed, his sisters begin crying as they observe him walking and talking...they keep seeing how strongly he resembles his Father in mannerisms and posture and facial expressions.

Gene is also blown away by how much his half-sibling's children resemble his own children when they were kids.

At this point, I'm totally absorbed in the show as compelling drama I can't tear my eyes from the screen.

But the heart-wrenching scene that inspired a few tears came when they all went to the cemetery where Gene's Father was buried.

It was very apparent that Gene was overcome when he realized where they were going when they arrived at the entrance. Shannon and his new-found siblings nearly had to drag him into the cemetery. When they arrived at their Father's grave, Gene's brother Jacob pulled out a letter that their Father had written, addressed to Gene, but never mailed or even completed it, and and read it to him aloud.

Gene Simmons utterly broke down.

After reading the letter to him, Shannon asks the entire entourage to give Gene a few moments alone at the graveside. Of course, the cameras backed off to a distance but continued to record, and the audio was still able to pick up Gene's lamentations and sorrow.

I cannot believe he would allow such footage to be broadcast on a worldwide TV show for such an utterly personal moment like that. There is absolutely no way the reactions or dialog could have been scripted or planned out. Perhaps the producers and such planned out the set up, knowing his reactions would be genuine and make for compelling TV.

If so, they were right.

If Gene has some desire to prove he's honest and doesn't care who sees him at his moments of greatest weakness, he certainly did so here.

Or...he knows that it's ratings gold and it's all about the money, and there is no place he won't go to whore out his personal traumas for the almighty dollar.

Probably a bit of both.

As it turns out, Gene discovers that in fact his Father didn't abandon him, his Mother took him and they left HIM to come to America. The show didn't go into much details about the split, but it was clear that Gene realized that decades of resentment for abandonment by his Father was ill-placed.

This show got to me.

It shows just how profound Fatherhood has in the life of a child and the life of a family. As a new Father myself, it brought home the realization of how much of a responsibility I have, and what role I will play in another person's life...whether I'm there or not.

In the end, we are all going to die. Money, fortune, fame...how much you get laid, or what degree of career success you achieve - it's all meaningless when you reach your final resting place and your flesh rots from your bones in your moldering grave.

The only way you achieve any real impact on this world, is by creating a family and perpetuating the cycle of life for your genealogy to carry on your bloodline.

In my view, most things in this world have no meaning other than family.

Fatherhood is a path that can lead to great heartache and pain...so much so, that some even find it better to burn himself alive in protest than continue to live with the loss and alienation of his children by the family-destroying State.

Back in my days of being a neo-con kool aid drinker, I used to listen to right wing talk radio all day long while I was at work, including the Dr. Laura show. There is really only one thing I ever really took from her show that has stuck with me all these years.

To paraphrase her: "We get two chances at family in this life. The one we are born into and have no control over, and the one we make for ourselves. The one you are born into may be screwed up, but the beautiful thing is you get your own chance to make it right for yourself."

Dannyfrom504 recently asked me if I thought marriage was worth it. I cannot recommend marriage and having kids to anyone. Every man has to make a calculated judgement of the risk versus the reward for himself. He must judge for himself if the woman he contemplates procreating with is a high-risk or low-risk gamble.

We all know of the great inherent risk it takes to get married and have children in today's Brave New World Order. The potential for great personal devastation is a very real possibility. But if you manage to make it turn out right...well, from my own perspective, there is no greater accomplishment or joy in this life.

To each his own.

ADDENDUM
07/01/2011

Upon re-reading this post, I realized there was something I wanted to add here - Gene Simmons is one of the most successful musicians in the history of Rock and Roll. He's purportedly slept with over 4000 women, is a multi-millionaire, lives in a mansion and has a former playboy playmate as the mother of his two children and is basically the epitome of secular, hedonistic success.

But none of that was able to fill the void in his life from having missed out on a good relationship with his Father.

Happiness can't be bought. Nor can it be reached through career success and financial success nor fame.

As TGP puts it in the comments:

Take it from an old wise man, family is the whole goddamn thing.

Not game. Not getting laid. Not self improvement. Not travel. Not parties. Not fun. Not fame. Not wealth. Those things only mean something when they are used in the context of and in support of your family relationships.

Find a woman who wants to have kids as much as you do, who makes that the number one central driving force of her life. Marry her. Start knocking kids out. You will be happy. Fuck all the other bullshit.
TGP

I think the point of what commenter TGP is getting at here is the lesson Gene Simmons learned when he reconnected with his family and learned the truth of his Father. He discovered too late that it did not match the caricature of a deadbeat that he had developed in his mind...but it did allow him to figure some things out. One of the most heart rendering things he said when he was left alone at the gravesite was his lament: "I am a good Father! I am a good Father!"

Obviously he sought to spare his own children the sense of abandonment he experienced growing up...and it shows in his relationship with his children. Even thought the reality show is most likely scripted, the genuine love and respect for the Simmons/Tweed family has for one another is obviously authentic.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

I've written several posts in the past regarding the primary means for which we often see press releases in the mainstream media regarding claims that meat, red meat and/or saturated fats are the cause of a host of illnesses and deaths like heart disease, diabetes, obesity and cancer.

The most common tactic employed is to use statistical analysis of observational studies to make a specious claim to demonize a certain food. In other words, most such claims conflate correlation with causation to mislead the average mass media consumer.

The primary M.O. for making such claims believable is largely based upon comparing the overall health between kinds of people: those that are health conscious and do all they can to try and attain good health by following conventional wisdom promulgated by the corporate agriculture, healthcare and pharmaceutical industries in the mainstream media -- vs. those people who don't care a whit and simply live lifestyles without regard to any and all healthcare advice.

In other words, using observational studies based on self-reporting questionnaires, press releases that breathlessly declare meat and saturated fats as agents of death and diseases are based on nothing more than comparing people who avoid or minimize the meat and fat consumption -- but who also commit to lifestyles that the mainstream media regularly touts as necessary for good health; things like regular exercise, avoiding smoking and excessive alcohol and drugs, and avoiding fast foods, sweets, pastries and processed snack foods vs. people who eat meat and fat with abandon because they're also smoking like chimneys, avoiding exercise, drinking like sailors and eating fast foods, sweets, desserts and snack foods on a regular basis without a second thought.

Such studies are basically comparing two different lifestyles - one of people who think health is important and are willing to sacrifice momentary satisfaction to their taste buds and comfort to achieve the desired state of health, and those who could care less and will eat whatever they want regardless of the conventional wisdom. The results of such a comparison are fairly intuitive to figure out...but the press releases of the mainstream mass media will usually point the finger at the meat and/or fat and claim that the difference in the results is due to those who focus on a "plant based diet" versus the filthy meat and saturated fat gluttons.

Because I'd also like to highlight other tactics employed by the sources behind such deceptive press releases: those based on studies that are deliberately "fixed" to reach a pre-determined outcome to support the overall narrative.

Stanton exposed on the sources of such dietary disinformation, and you really should read his entire post...but the following is a quick summary of 3 tactics used by researchers to prove the up is down, black is white and we should all be vegetarians...

Quit While You're Ahead

Stanton highlights a particular study that sought to show that "Foods high in fat are less satiating than foods high in carbohydrates."

Anyone who has tried the paleo diet for even a short period of time, knows this is simply rubbish. So how do researchers make their case? They measure satiety of various foods FOR ONLY 120 MINUTES...2 Hours.

In 2 hours, a full belly of any kind of food will still leave most people without any severe disorders satiated. Try it for yourself...on an empty stomach, eat a couple of eggs and bacon until you are full, than time how long it takes before you feel hungry again.

Than, on the following day, try eating oatmeal and a bagel with jam and some fruit. See how long it takes before you feel hungry again.

In either case, most normal people will find that 2 hours will not reveal the difference in satiation between the high carb vs. the low carb breakfast. But that doesn't stop the press release from claiming that the high carb diet is "more satiating" than the low carb one...

The next example of misleading research tactics is:

Construct an Artificial Scenario

The press release conclusion:

“Fat, not carbohydrate, is the macronutrient associated with overeating and obesity…Although more data are required, currently the best dietary advice for weight maintenance and for controlling hunger is to consume a low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet with a high fiber content.”

How do they "prove" this?

Thus, to examine in more detail the mechanisms involved in the effects of carbohydrate and fat on food intake, we infused pure nutrients either through intravenous or intragastric routes.”

The only people who actually get their nutrients via IV are those in a coma or on life support. Another worthless study that means nothing to the 99% of us who actually masticate and swallow our food.

Than we have the next means of creating misleading studies:

Confound Your Variables

In a study from 1987, the researchers sought to prove that a "high fat diet" was the cause of obesity by feeding a group of women an alternate diet between low and high fat and measured the results.

They confounded their variables in three different ways.

First, in the high fat diet, the fats used were primarily Omega-6 imbalanced vegetable oils with a bit of milk and/or butterfat mixed in. Not all "high fat diets" are equal. Even mainstream media has been forced to admit the difference between trans-fats and regular saturated fats...which is why there is a few margarine brands nowadays that tout "TRANS FAT FREE." But back in 1987? Margarine was considered the superior health food to saturated fat rich butter.

The next means of confounding the variables was to mix up the serving sizes by "units" whether it was "high fat" or "low fat."

“All foods, including those served as units (eg, muffins, sandwiches), could be consumed entirely or in part. … Sandwiches were available in whole or half units.”

The final way in which this disingenuous study confounded their variables was to mix up the various meals on the test subjects. Stanton notes:

A typical subject would consume a low-fat meal one day, a high-fat meal the next, a medium-fat meal the third day, and the sequence would repeat.

Can you imagine a drug trial where patients took one drug on odd days, and another drug on even days? How could you possibly disentangle the effects?

All of us have eaten a huge dinner and not been hungry the next morning…or gone to bed hungry and been ravenous when we awakened. In this insane design, each high-fat meal was guaranteed to be surrounded by two days of lower-fat meals. Yet in Figure 2, they graph energy intake for each day as if it were the same people eating each diet for two weeks!

In conclusion, this study is triply useless: first, due to using known industrial toxins for the “high-fat” diet, second, due to unequal portion size, and third, due to an intentionally broken design that commingles the effects of the three diets.

So there you have it...4 ways in which Press Releases claim scientific evidence for misinformation regarding diet and nutrition: Conflating correlation with causation in statistical analysis of observational studies, and 3 techniques for running studies to reach predetermined conclusions.

Next time you read, hear or see another breathless claim in the corporate mass media denouncing meat and/or fat and urging everyone to eat a plant based diet of "fresh fruits, vegetables and whole grains," it's almost a virtual certainty that they're either reporting on studies comparing health conscious people versus those who don't care...or they are reporting on studies that were fixed to support the claims rather than an unbiased study designed to discover the truth.

Since the early 2000's all 50 States in the US have created Sex Offender registries. I've looked at my own State's registry several times, and it's not surprising to note that 99% of all the registered offenders are men.

Now some of these men certainly deserve to be on that list...rapists and pedophiles who were convicted and served time for their crimes. But you also have guys on that list who are convicted for crimes like "Sexual Harassment, 3rd Degree" aka a guy may have grabbed a girl's ass or something trivial like that which has now become a criminal offense, branding the unfortunate man with the 21st centuries version of the Scarlet letter for the rest of his life.

We've also seen the emergence of sites like Don't Date Him Girl, in which women could upload photos and info of men they've dated to supposedly warn their sisters of the players and cheaters who pumped and dumped them.

To date, there has not been a comparable registry for women...until now.

Paul Elam at AVoiceForMen has just unveiled his latest plan for anti-feminist activism...striking back at the FemBorg's insidious Vagenda (I picked up that clever pun up from a commenter over at Alte's...not sure whom) by giving them a dose of their own medicine. Paul and his cohorts have used wiki-media software to create register-her.com.

Upon announcement of the site on A Voice For Men Radio Show, some pro-feminist asshat emailed the following complaint to wikipedia:

Subject: Anti-feminists using Wikimedia software to paint women as rapists and child molesters
Hello. I'm wondering if you could please check out whether the following Web site is in compliance with the terms of use on Wikimedia software. It's an anti-feminist Web site that posts names, pictures, addresses, phone numbers, and even "routes to work" of women that the site deems to be false accusers of rape, among other designations.

The owners of the above Web site announced the launch of it on a broadcast of their internet-based radio station today, June 28, 2011. In this broadcast, the host, Paul Elam, claims that the contact information, place of residence, place of employment, personal phone numbers, work phone numbers, and even routes from their home to place of employment will be placed on this site which uses Wikimedia software.
Here's the radio broadcast where the above statements were made:http://www.blogtalkradio.com/avoiceformen/2011/06/29/ftsu-big-time

Please advise on whether this is a permissible use of your software, and if not permissible, whether or not you intend to revoke their license to your your[sic] software. Thank you.

"...to paint women?" As far as I can tell, most of the women registered are infamous and widely recognized and/or convicted for their crimes...like Debra LaFave, convicted of statutory rape of a 14 year old student, or Mary Winkler who shot her husband in the back with a shotgun and got away with a reduced conviction for claiming he abused her.

Almost one week after having wikipedia unjustly delete Thomas J. Ball's page, it's a rather fitting tribute to use basically the same software to do an end-around against the pro-feminst wikipedia editors and create a registry to expose the worst female offenders of our Brave New World Order.

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Too often, pointing the things I will discuss in this post results in swift dismissal as "conspiracy theory."

Problem is, at the highest echelons of the UN, there is no conspiracy theory. This is the Agenda for the 21st century, and the people responsible for implementing it's agenda are not even attempting to hide their plans.

Agenda 21 is a comprehensive plan of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by organizations of the United Nations System, Governments, and Major Groups in every area in which human impacts on the environment.

There is an agenda that they have planned for us all, and are in fact implementing it incrementally and gradually over the space of decades.

We are in the midst of it right now.

Just sit back and think for a moment...how often do you encounter the phrase "sustainable development" being used in TV shows, political ads, newspaper columns and reports, and political speeches and interviews by talking heads on the Tell-A-Vision?

This phrase is in popular use everywhere. In the past 5 years, I've travelled to many different US States on both the West and East Coasts, and have been to Australia and all across the UK. This phrase is in use everywhere I've been.

This is no accident.

It's part of the social engineering program being implemented by the education curriculum from grade school all the way through Ivy League University level, and is perpetually reinforced by the various organs of the Western world's mass media.

The primary feature of "sustainable development" is "population control."

"One of the things we could do about it is to change the technologies, to put out less of this pollution, to stabilize the population, and one of the principle ways of doing that is to empower and educate girls and women. You have to have ubiquitous availability of fertility management so women can choose how many children have, the spacing of the children.

You have to lift child survival rates so that parents feel comfortable having small families and most important – you have to educate girls and empower women. And that’s the most powerful leveraging factor, and when that happens, then the population begins to stabilize and societies begin to make better choices and more balanced choices."

Al Gore is not speaking of some theory...he's talking about using the social engineering program already effected in the West, and exporting it to the Third World to reduce their population growth. And while many folks will read that last paragraph and no doubt quip that "Yes, Al Gore is a raving lunatic" I would answer he is not crazy at all. He's simply promoting the official UN Agenda 21.

(b) To increase the proportion of women decision makers, planners, technical advisers, managers and extension workers in environment and development fields;

Of course, the more Women decision makers in Government and business, the less women are at home breeding undesirable population growth.

(c) To consider developing and issuing by the year 2000 a strategy of changes necessary to eliminate constitutional, legal, administrative, cultural, behavioural, social and economic obstacles to women's full participation in sustainable development and in public life;

Eleven years later, it's safe to say this has been accomplished entirely in the West...which is why we are now in the "export to the 3rd world" phase.

(d) To establish by the year 1995 mechanisms at the national, regional and international levels to assess the implementation and impact of development and environment policies and programmes on women and to ensure their contributions and benefits;

(e) To assess, review, revise and implement, where appropriate, curricula and other educational material, with a view to promoting the dissemination to both men and women of gender-relevant knowledge and valuation of women's roles through formal and non-formal education, as well as through training institutions, in collaboration with non-governmental organizations;

(f) To formulate and implement clear governmental policies and national guidelines, strategies and plans for the achievement of equality in all aspects of society, including the promotion of women's literacy, education, training, nutrition and health and their participation in key decision-making positions and in management of the environment, particularly as it pertains to their access to resources, by facilitating better access to all forms of credit, particularly in the informal sector, taking measures towards ensuring women's access to property rights as well as agricultural inputs and implements;

(g) To implement, as a matter of urgency, in accordance with country-specific conditions, measures to ensure that women and men have the same right to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children and have access to information, education and means, as appropriate, to enable them to exercise this right in keeping with their freedom, dignity and personally held values;

Recall Al Gore: "one of the principle ways of doing that is to empower and educate girls and women." This is the primary impetus behind sections d though g. Getting the womynz educated and in the workforce is THE best way to institute population control for sustainable development.

(h) To consider adopting, strengthening and enforcing legislation prohibiting violence against women and to take all necessary administrative, social and educational measures to eliminate violence against women in all its forms.

In other words, to set up Western styled family court systems that empower women (by dis-empowering men) in traditionally Patriarchal societies. It's the same old playbook already run successfully in the West. Violence against women is the ultimate red herring. Afterall, what normal thinking, civilized person would be "FOR" violence against women? But the real agenda, as we now see it in full effect in the West, is Violence (BY THE STATE) against Men.

Women in the West have been empowered, and overwhelmingly "educated" and the desired reduction in population growth already well underway. The program has been an overwhelming success, and it's time to export it to the rest of the world.

This is the true Agenda of the feminist movement. To get women to voluntarily believe and internalize a value system in which they actively want to pursue education and career instead of marriage and kids.

This is also why we are constantly bombarded in the mainstream mass media with stories of women's oppression in the Third World as justification for our continued fiat wars on foreign shores.
"Women are not even allowed to go to school!"

That's because they're at home with their mother's learning their cultural traditions which involve being a wife and mother to a large family...this cultural tradition is simply NOT sustainable to the planners of the 21st century agenda.

This is the primary reason why Hillary Clinton is the Secretary of the Feminist State...she is the foremost proponent of using the US military industrial complex to export feminism to the Middle East and Africa.

Time to empower women on a global scale to reduce the population and implement "sustainable development."

Friday, June 24, 2011

Winston Smith works as a clerk in the Records Department of the Ministry of Truth, where his job is to rewrite historical documents so they match the constantly changing current party line. This involves revising newspaper articles and doctoring photographs—mostly to remove "unpersons," people who have fallen foul of the party.

Anyone reading my blog, no doubt already knows the sad and maddening story of this man who could no longer take being treated like a slave by the Family Court system and burned himself to death.

You all know that his story has largely been ignored by the mainstream, corporate media...after all, the details of the story and his last will and statement don't jibe with the overriding narrative of the huge problem of "deadbeat dads" and the law enforcement and courts that have been created to deal with this "problem."

I personally did not bother posting about this event when it first hit the headlines in the alternative online media and the manosphere.

Reading his last statement Mr. Ball mailed to the press was a bit painful to read for myself. In many ways, it resembles the situation of my long time high school buddy who killed himself last November. Kids alienated by a vindictive ex, crushing child support obligations and official sanctions despite unemployment...desperation...finally suicide.

We live under a system for which men are chewed up and spit out...and it actively seeks to conceal the truth about this system and the horrible toll it extracts from mankind to prop up the status quo.

Which is exactly why we have some person going by the handle "Master of Puppets" doing Winston Smith's job for Wikipedia.

Re-writing history to suit the ruling party's meta-narrative.

If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — forever

To paraphrase Mr. Orwell...

If you want a picture of the present, imagine a man setting himself on fire because he could no longer stand being oppressed by society - and nobody cared.

Monday, June 20, 2011

I can't wait for this paleo fad to finally come to an end, but I fear it's become such a religion for so many that it's going to overstay its welcome.

First of all, "paleo" is NOT like most other diets. It is not a "diet" plan to shed a few unwanted pounds from the holidays.

It is not a program to slim down in time to look your best for your summer swimwear.

It is not a "fad" for which some so-called expert goes on the Oprah Winfrey show -- oh wait, she retired...good riddance -- Dr. Phil, Dr. Oz or The View, and women all over the country race to embrace their inner cave-woman and start eating bacon, fatty cuts of meat and free range chickenskin sopping in grass fed dairy cow butter.

It's not a "diet," per say, and it's certainly not a "religion."

It's simply recognizing the truth about nutrition and what our bodies were designed to thrive on...and the foods that are part of an industrial agricultural system designed to maximize profits by appealing to your taste buds and resisting spoilage for as long as possible.

That's not a fad. It's a way of life. It's understanding just how truly damaging certain neolithic food creations are to the human physiology.

It's understanding just how ubiquitous the marketing propaganda and health misinformation is propagated in our mainstream consciousness and how it is all designed to guide our choices when grocery shopping and eating out.

It's quite simply, gaining knowledge of the truth and making decisions accordingly.

And while SOME people definitely take it to the point of religious fervor, that's not what you see when you read the works of people who have been at the forefront of this "paleo" movement for a number of years. Mark Sisson has his 80/20 principle (which I basically follow), and he also puts sugar in his coffee every morning, and eats dark chocolate and drinks alcohol on a regular basis. Richard Nikoley eats corn tortillas that his hispanic wife cooks....and I agree wholeheartedly. Mexican food is just not the same without some tortilla and/or masa flour. (I just make sure to only eat corn tortilla processed in the traditional manner of nixtamalizado - in which the corn is treated with lime, which neutralizes the lectins and phytic acid and other naturally occurring anti-nutrients in the corn - before grinding into flour.) Many other noted Paleo bloggers have also discussed adding potatoes and white rice back into your diet in moderation once you no longer have SAD related issues to deal with.

This to me is the reason why "paleo" is not a strict, dogmatic religion type diet fad.

Another reason why so many people become overly-enthusiastic about the "paleo" diet, is that once you embrace certain paradigms - namely the healthy goodness of saturated fats and meat - it's something else to realize there is such a wealth of simply delicious foods for which you do not have to limit yourself on and eat until you are completely satiated on it AND STILL LOSE WEIGHT. That is a completely different experience than all of the other real Fad Diets for which you have to count your calories or eat smaller portions that leave you still hungry and irritated. Once you realize that not only will filling you up full of bacon, eggs, cheese, steaks, fish, ham, lamb and bison and loads of butter and grease will not only NOT make you fat, it will actually help you lose weight...well, a lot of folks can't help but get excited and enthusiastic once they realize that the paradigm of mainstream society for which your weight issues are merely a matter of gluttony and laziness is nothing but a BIG FAT FUCKING LIE.

When people first adopt the paleo diet, the physiological and mental effects are rather dramatic. You lose weight, you start feeling energetic, and a host of minor irritable health conditions go away.

This usually comes from those who first go 'Paleo' extreme and cut out all carbohydrates except for cruciferous vegetables, and don't eat dairy and sugar...even fruit.

For the average person raised on the SAD their whole lives, the transformative effects can be really dramatic over a short period of time. They note these effects, and it becomes almost dogmatic to them to avoid all carbs is the key to their diet success.

In the short term, this is no doubt true. For people who have developed varying levels of insulin resistance, visceral fat, and on the constant ebb and flow of the high-carb/insulin/blood sugar roller coaster, following a strict paleo regime for a short period of time (several months) would be good to lose the excess weight, restore insulin sensitivity and stabilize their metabolism and even energy levels. But once you've reached the point where these things are no longer an issue, you need not be rigid in your adherence nor do you need to treat all carbohydrates as the equivalent to cocaine or heroin.

Once a strict adherence to paleo-tenets reverses the various effects of the SAD (everyone is different...some may take longer than others), you can begin to add certain starchy foods (like potatos and rice), fruit and dairy back into your diet and occasionally indulge in neolithic foods like sugar and alcohol, without losing the gains your initial transition phase brought about.

This is nothing new, either. The original Atkins diet was based on "induction" in which you cut out ALL carbohydrates except for fibrous, cruciferous veggies. After a number of days of carb avoidance, your body goes into ketosis and you begin to burn your bodies stored fat as fuel, and the ketones from that process begin to show up in your urine. Once you got beyond the induction phase and lost your excess body fat and restored your metabolism, the old Atkins diet preached adding carbs in smaller proportions back into your diet once again. If you you began to notice you were gaining weight again, than go back on the ketogenic diet and than slowly add the carbohydrates back again until you find your optimal maintenance point.

It's not rocket science...and it is not a religious edict either.

No need to become the Paleo-Taliban, invoking holy war on all plant based carbohydrates or declare jihad on all factory farmed meats. The "paleo" diet paradigm is just a general understanding to guide your decision making about your overall consumption behavior to maximize your health. Use your common sense, and understand and accept that the occasional deviation will not result in a diet heresy that will destroy all of your dietary progress, or doom you to ill health and diseases.

For instance, I try to avoid grains as much as possible in my overall consumption patterns. For someone with IBS or Krohns or Celiac, they pretty much have to strictly adhere to 100% avoidance to avoid the bad reactions they get to gluten-containing foods.

But I do not, nor have I ever, had any sort of digestive or auto-immune disorders associated with grain based glutens. So when my sister baked me a Black Russian Birthday Cake (Chocolate cake with Kahlua & Vodka frosting), I cut myself a huge piece of cake and a couple of scoops of ice cream and I FUCKING ENJOYED IT.

And all of my friends and family couldn't help but make comments about how I'm eating all that sugar and wheat flour. I laugh and tell them "my diet is a general guide that I follow. It is not a strict religion. I am not going to diet-purgatory for a single transgression, I am not going to immediately put back on the 35 lbs. of fat that I lost nearly 5 years ago when I first went "paleo," nor am I going to have a heart attack or develop diabetes from the occasional rare indulgence. I appreciate the effort involved in making a custom cake to celebrate my special occasion, and the spirit in which it was given to me and my family.

This does not mean I will go back to eating whole grain breads and cereals on a daily basis, or that I will resume drinking soda on a daily basis, or that I will go back to my former state of avoiding all saturated fats and minimizing my meat consumption and cooking with Omega-6 imbalanced vegetable oils.

Terry also brought up a related issue in which she cooks for a family that does not follow the basic low-carb diet that she herself tries to follow. For one thing, the cost issue. If your budget is tight, and grass fed beef is out of the picture...better to eat factory farmed beef than to eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or Ramen noodles. Better to eat SPAM and eggs for breakfast than a big bowl of breakfast cereal and lowfat milk. When I can afford it, I buy grass fed beef, buffalo, lamb and free range chicken. When I can't...well, I still have to feed my family. While I oppose factory farming on principle, we still need meat to eat.

I wish I really could influence the market demand for free range produce so that no one else would eat factory farmed meat, making free range foods the standard fare in all grocery markets. But that's not happening anytime soon, and the reality is while factory farmed meat is substandard in nutrition to free range fare...it's still better than eating a grain-based/vegetable oil type processed foods that makes up the majority of the SAD.

Another consideration is to avoid being the social outcast at gatherings and events. Everyone hates the diet fascist attempting to control how everyone else eats. If there's one thing I'm sensitive to, it's not becoming the preachy asshole killjoy telling people that the food they are eating and enjoying at the moment is the reason why they have so many health problems. If someone offers me food that I generally try to avoid, I just say no thank you, I'm not hungry at the moment...or I serve myself food and avoid the eating food I don't want to ingest, even if it's on my own plate. Like eating the cheeseburger and not the bun, or the pizza toppings without the crust, or pour the spaghetti meat sauce on white rice instead of wheat based pasta.

"Paleo" is not fad. People that figure out the underlying principles and change their lifestyle accordingly will have gained the knowledge to guide their dietary choices for a lifetime...including the occasional indulgence that is diametrically opposed to those principles. It's about attaining good health to enjoy life. Sometimes enjoying life means not eating the perfect diet 100% of the time...just most of the time.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

It’s not the snack aisle, the cereal aisle, or even the bread aisle...it’s the profit aisle.

What do you call it when some people actively and knowingly promote lies so as to profit to the detriment of those who believe those lies? A CONSPIRACY.

Yet so many people have been conditioned by our modern media to automatically reject anything as soon as the word CONSPIRACY is mentioned. So much so, that whenever somebody goes out of there way to point out all of the signs of a blatant conspiracy, they still couch in terms of denying it is "CONSPIRACY THEORY" to try and avoid the Pavlovian response that has been programmed deeply into the psyche of the average sheeple in our BraveNewWorldOrder.

J. Stanton of Gnolls.org has quickly become my favorite Paleo-diet blogger (one of these days I'll get around to buying his book). Like myself, he does not post regularly, about once a week or so. But his posts always prove to be well worth the wait (I'm sure I can't say the same for myself, as sometimes I'm just uninspired or busy, and I do sometimes put up throwaway posts simply because I'm tired of having an old post headline for weeks...but I digress).

His most recent piece, You Are A Radical, And So Am I: Paleo Reaches the Ominous "Stage 3" is a complete dismantling of conventional wisdom regarding diet, nutrition and health care. He basically deconstructs the propaganda that permeates our society and clearly exposes the motive as to why so many organizations and corporations have vested financial interests in promoting so many falsehoods and lies.

First off, he describes a basic principle of how a healthy economy works: by adding value to a product or service.

Adding Value: The Foundation Of Functional Economies

An economy based entirely on selling the same things back and forth to each other for ever-increasing amounts of money is doomed to eventual collapse. As we found out just a couple years ago, flipping houses isn’t the same as having a manufacturing base and a world that wants to buy what we make.

Stated more generally, an economy is only sustainable to the degree that its participants add value by their actions. Factory workers add value by turning raw materials into clothes and cars and electronics; farmers turn seeds and soil and sunlight into crops; ranchers turn calves and grass into beef; engineers turn ideas into buildable products; truckers move things from where they are to where they’re wanted; cashiers and stockers and managers and janitors turn a locked building full of things into a system by which you can find what you want and exchange money for it; and so on. Added value – cost of design – cost of production = profit.

This is not to be confused with the labor theory of value, which claims that labor has intrinsic value, and indeed, is the only ‘fair’ measure of value. This is hogwash. It’s easy to spend years of effort and not add a single penny of value—because value is determined by the buyer, not the seller. It doesn’t matter how much time I’ve spent making a coat rack if it’s ugly and no one wants to buy it!

Moving ahead: the more value we can add, the more profit we can make. It should be obvious that one way to add value is to transform cheap raw materials into an expensive finished product.

So far so good. No one can complain if you take a raw material, and improve it into a valuable product to increase it's value, like turning some gold into a beautiful piece of jewelry.

But when it comes to the food industry, this concept becomes insidious and clearly lays out an iron clad motive for why so many vested interests support the promulgation of lies and misinformation regarding diet and nutrition.

One reason grains are so cheap in the USA, of course, is gigantic subsidies for commodity agriculture that, while advertised as helping farmers, go mostly to agribusinesses like Archer Daniels Midland ($62 billion in sales), Cargill ($108 billion), ConAgra ($12 billion), and Monsanto ($11 billion)—and result in a corn surplus so large that we are forced to turn corn into ethanol and feed it to our cars, at a net energy loss!

“There isn’t one grain of anything in the world that is sold in a free market. Not one! The only place you see a free market is in the speeches of politicians. People who are not in the Midwest do not understand that this is a socialist country.”
-Dwayne Andreas, then-CEO of Archer Daniels Midland

Note that the profit for the processors and middlemen comes out of the pockets of the producer and the consumer. Farmers are squeezed by the 12 cents per pound, and consumers are squeezed by the $4.40 per loaf.

In contrast, pork bellies cost $1.20 per pound today.
A pound of bacon costs about $5.
That’s a 400% increase…

…which looks like a lot until you compare it with 2700%-6400% for grains. Also, unlike grain products, bacon must be stored, shipped, and sold under continuous refrigeration—and it has a much shorter shelf life.

It’s clear that it’s far more profitable to sell us processed grain products than meat, eggs, and vegetables…which leaves a lot of money available to spend on persuading us to buy them. Are you starting to understand why grains are encased in colorful packaging, pushed on us as “heart-healthy” by the government, and advertised continually in all forms of media?

And when we purchase grass-fed beef directly from the rancher, eggs from the farmer, and produce from the grower, we are bypassing the entire monumentally profitable system of industrial agriculture—the railroads, grain elevators, antibiotics, growth hormones, plows, combines, chemical fertilizers (the Haber process, by which ammonium nitrate fertilizer is made, uses 3-5% of world natural gas production!), processors, inspectors, fortifiers, manufacturers, distributors, and advertisers that profit so handsomely by turning cheap grains into expensive food-like substances.

There you have it. Stanton reveals all the motives necessary for why Big Ag corporations and their Government lobbying and funding for misleading "studies" and the complicit corporate media scaring the masses into consuming their grain products as "healthy."

And yet he still felt the need to write the disqualifier in his conclusion:

Conclusion: You Are A Radical (And So Am I)

Simply by eating a paleo diet, we have made ourselves enemies of the establishment, and will be treated henceforth as dangerous radicals.

This is not a conspiracy theory. By eschewing commodity crops and advocating the consumption of grass-fed meat, pastured eggs, and local produce, we are making several very, very powerful enemies.

The medical and nutritional establishments hate paleo, because we’re exposing the fact that they’ve been wrong for decades and have killed millions of people with their bad advice.
The agribusinesses and industrial food processors hate paleo, because we’re hurting their business by not buying their highly profitable grain- and soy-based products.
The mainstream media hates paleo, because they profit handsomely from advertising those grain- and soy-based products.
The government hates paleo, because they’re the enforcement arm of big agribusinesses, industrial food processors, and mainstream media—and because their subsidy programs create mountains of surplus grain that must be consumed somehow.

He wrote a brilliant post showing precisely why there is in fact a very real Conspiracy...but has to put this disclaimer on it so that certain people don't ignore his rock solid case because of the cultural programming to discount anything labeled as "conspiracy theory" as outlandish and improbable.

It's not a conspiracy theory that giant agricultural corporations lobby politicians who in turn appoint their stooges to regulatory agencies like the USDA and FDA.

It's not a conspiracy theory that many Doctors understand the truth about grains and the lies regarding saturated fats and protein...yet the mainstream medical establishment still promotes statin drugs, and high carb/low-fat diets as their solutions to the problems of diabetes, heart disease etc.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Anytime somebody criticizes the Federal Reserve System and tries to point out that the entire system is a private banking cartel masquerading as a "quasi-Governmental" agency, people defend the Fed and it's policies. They conflate any and every criticism of the Fed as "conspiracy theory."

Understand that our modern economy is based not on MONEY…but on DEBT. An obligation to promise to paying the bankers – WHO DID NOTHING MORE THAN TYPE A NUMBER INTO A COMPUTER IN THEIR BANK LEDGER SHEET PROGRAM AND – VOILA! – you too can sign up for 21st century serfdom to achieve the “American Dream!”

But don’t look at the Bankers in your local neighborhood bank as your Feudal overlord…he’s just a mid-level overseer of the Lord’s vast estates.

See, his bank, in turn, has to borrow a fraction of their funds from the central banking system so that they can turn around and obligate YOU in your pursuit of the “American Dream.”

Does this sound outlandish or confusing to you?

Apparently, it did.

Here's some quotes from that article:

Richard Brodie:

A bank can’t create $1000 from a $100 deposit. It creates $90, which can then be deposited in another bank and create $81, and so on. There’s a decent Wikipedia article about fractional-reserve banking that seems to agree with me.

Lynch:

This doesn’t make sense to me, could you please elaborate further?

The initial $100 deposit, which could then be used to lend out $90.. that makes sense. The bank makes interest off of what it loans out on the $90, eventually recouping the initial $90 and then some. That’s how I’ve always understood banking to work.

However, when you say the $100 deposit becomes the “reserve” for a $1000 loan.. how does that work? In the first case, the bank takes the $90 from the account. In this second case, where does the missing $900 come from? At some point the borrower gets $1000 (for their car, business, whatever) and spends it. Then they are on the hook for paying it back. The bank still has to give out $1000. How do they do that from someone else’s $100 deposit?

Anti Idiocy:

I too question the accuracy of this analysis. I’m not saying it’s wrong, fractional reserve banking isn’t an area of great expertise for me. But it sounds fishy. My understanding is that if the bank receives a deposit of $100, it can loan out $90 of that. It doesn’t have to keep in reserve more than 10% of total deposits.

Gunn:

Technically this analysis is all wrong.
The $100 deposit is actually a bank liability on its balance sheet, not an asset. Any loans made to customers are assets on its balance sheet, as these represent monies the bank is owed.

ABS:

I’m sure HL means well, but this article really ought to be taken down – its not going to make The Spearhead look good, and really has nothing to do with MRA, guyinism, or whatever one wants to call it. Yes, money is created through the banking system, as some of the commenters have noted, but not in the way described by HL.

That's without even referencing a banker goon who used the handle Dexter Morgan to attack me in that thread.

Fractional reserve banking is not exception: if people don’t deposit the money in their bank account, the bank is unable to loan more than what it has already.
The fraction of none is always none.
If they do, what the bank do is to take a loan from the people putting the money in their account and loaning to others.

The bank, at the end, have received a loan from A, C, E and is able to loan to B, D, F
The resources used by the bank to loan are the initial 100$, the 80$ of nail, the 64 $ of wood, etc.
There is no creation of resources from thin air, only displacement of them in time (and hoping all the takers pay back the loans).

Banks actually create money when they lend it. Here’s how it works: Most of a bank’s loans are made to its own customers and are deposited in their checking accounts. Because the loan becomes a new deposit, just like a paycheck does, the bank once again holds a small percentage of that new amount in reserve and again lends the remainder to someone else, repeating the money-creation process many times.

I can't say it any plainer than the Dallas branch of the Federal Reserve does right there.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Apparently the highly respected, long-time denizen of the man-o-sphere, Brendan, aka Novaseeker, has decided to move on and focus on other thing's in his life, rather than the raging debates in this corner teh interwebz.

I’m posting this on a couple of websites, so that people can be aware. Nothing dramatic, but more in the way of an explanation, as departures in this neck of the woods without explanation seem to create consternation.

I am departing from this corner of the internet. There are many reasons for this, and this is not a sudden decision by any means. Most of this was written a few weeks ago when I took my old blogs down, but I have been tinkering with it for a while, and, thankfully, it’s much shorter than my average comment length.

The main reason is that I disagree too much with too much of what others seem to agree upon, and it creates too much dissonance for me to be interested in participating actively. I have said what I have to say, and I think others know where I stand, and have benefited (or not) from this, and for me personally it is time to move on. This may sound harsh, but so much that now happens in this corner of the internet is quite irrelevant to real life, in many ways, and so many of the commentators are just shockingly removed from reality. At least the reality that I know and have always known.

I am not a traditionalist. I have found, through spending time with them, that I disagree with both their extreme form (Laura Woods), their intermediate form (Mark Richardson) and their mild form (Alte and her commenters). I don’t agree with the ideas, with the separation from reality, with much of the substance. It was intriguing at first, but ultimately it is a walk away from shared reality into a personal reality which I do not respect, which I think is unrealistic, and which is also deeply unmotivating.

I am also not a men’s rights activist. I don’t think this is sensible. Other than marginal improvements, like Glenn Sacks and his group are achieving (and are more than worthy of support), this is never going to be anything approaching a movement. Men don’t work that way, and it’s a wrong-headed way of approaching things.

As I have said many times, I am agnostic on marriage, really. If a man wants to get married, knowing the risks, that’s his decision. I think enough men have spoken about that by now that it’s already out there as a popular enough meme as far as I can tell on mainstream websites. If not, then that’s also their decision. The endless discussions ad nauseam about marriage and finding mates are tiresome, repetitive and frankly not terribly interesting or influential after a time. It’s great that others are willing to pursue this, but marriage as an end in itself is not something I am willing to devote much energy towards in this culture, to be honest.

I have participated for few years in this space of the internet, but all good things come to an end. I think this is an insight that many of us who have participated for a bit longer have had. There is a time for everything under the sun, and at this time, it is time for me to retreat from this space and devote my time to other things that are more productive for me at this time. I wish you all well, wherever your endgame may be.

Friday, June 3, 2011

There's a commonly repeated meme in this corner of the interwebz...that female hypergamy means women are constantly looking to "trade up" to the highest status male than can attract, and will jump ship to a seemingly higher value mate whenever the opportunity presents itself.

It is also commonly stated that hypergamy is women only looking to mate with men who have better jobs or higher pay than what they make.

This is not what hypergamy is.

Hypergamy explains why some women do in fact "trade up" when the opportunity presents itself, or why they only seek relationships with people more successful than they are...but these things in and of themselves are not the definition of hypergamy.

Hypergamy simply means women's base sexual nature is attracted to a higher status in relation to herself. In other words, if she does not "look up" to a man in some way, she will not be attracted to that man. The higher status can be on one or more characteristics...which is why the unemployed musician can often date a woman who has job and disposable income. She may make more money...but she "looks up" to his musical talents, and he may be physically good looking to boot, despite not having a job, money or a car and so therefore her hypergamous attraction instincts are satisfied in mating with him, despite her higher socio-economic status.

Hypergamy does not mean women are incapable of controlling their behavior while under the influences of those base instincts.

A happily married woman may meet a man who sends her hypergamy detection meter beeping off the charts, and she may or not act on that instinctual attraction. Every woman is different...the problem with today's world is that society at large encourages women to follow this instinct to be "true to herself" or that "happiness" is the most important thing in her life. It is essentially a message telling women to let their hypergamous nature have complete control of her decision making.

But her actions themselves are not hypergamy. Hypergamy describes the biological basis for her attraction triggers...like how youth, fertility, symmetrical features and shapely figures are male's attraction triggers. How you control your attraction and how you react to it will vary on a whole host of other factors like your belief system, your moral views, and your abilities to rationalize or justify breaking those views if you chose to do so.

To call a woman dumping her man for a higher status man "hypergamy" is missing the real point.

Hypergamy is not a negative female trait.

Nor is it a positive one.

It just is.

For men, the most important thing here is to understand what hypergamy is, and observe how she acts on it. By observing this, you can determine her character and suitability for investing resources into a committed relationship...if that's what your looking for. And if you do find yourself involved, understanding what it is and how it works is also the key in making sure your relationship can succeed in the long run. Understanding her hypergamous hardwiring means you've got to maintain some form of respect and admiration from her to maintain long term attraction.

I remember a girlfriend I had in my early 20's. I had tickets to an upcoming concert and found out the band was gonna be signing autographs at a nearby record store a few days prior. Her friend's and I joined a throng of fans to wait in line to meet the band. When it came to our turn, the security in the store ushered me in, I got to say a few words with the band members while they signed my CD cover, than the security hustled me outside...while my girlfriend and her 3 friends were still getting their merch signed.

Now, I know my girlfriend had a thing for the bass player. I was pissed that the security guards wouldn't let me stay with her until her stuff was signed and she got her photos with the band...as soon as my CD got signed they almost threw me out of the store.

My girlfriend and her friends were in there a lot longer talking to the band than I had. When they finally came out, turns out a few of the band members were trying to convince them to come to a party with the band after the autograph session. While my girlfriend was flattered and basically on cloud 9...she turned him down and came back to me after getting her pictures and autographs.

Here was a case of extreme attraction and definitely status far above and beyond my own status. If hypergamy were the uncontrollable force of nature many bloggers and commenters describe it as, she should have gone with him and had hot groupie sex and forgotten all about my ejected ass waiting outside that record store.

She later told me that yeah, she sure as hell thought about going with him...but the she also knew damn well he was only interested in casual sex and she did not want to throw away our relationship for a one night stand with a rock star who would forget all about her and be on to the next groupie fling in no time.

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

How do you feel right now? Chances are, the way you feel right now is directly related to how your guts feel...literally.

The ancient Hawaiians believed that the guts were the seat of mankind's thoughts and feelings. The word for it was na'au (nah-ow). Here's the definition from the Hawaiian Dictionary:

NA-AU, s. The small intestines of men or animals, which the Hawaiians suppose to be the seat of thought, of intellect and the affections.
2. The internal parts, i. e., the inwards of animals. The bowels.
3. The affections; the mind; the moral nature; the heart; the seat of the moral powers.

Perhaps this came from their recognition that we humans often experience sensations in our gut when we go through extreme emotional fluctuations. From the giddy butterflies of ecstasy to the gnawing pain and ache of dread, we often don't really think too much about how our guts impact our overall health and well being.

But certain scientists have been researching the precise physiological role that the na'au plays in human health and the results of such research confirms that the Hawaiians were more more correct in their intuitive beliefs than they knew...

Dr. Art Ayers has a blog he only occasionally posts at...he's obviously a busy guy. But when he does post, it's well worth the wait. His latest deals with Gut flora - or bacteria.

Thanks to the modern day marketing messages and health scares associated with flu season, we now live in a germophobic society. We now have anti-bacterial soaps and hand cleaners all over the place. I see hand-cleaner dispensers at the entrances to buildings and grocery stores all over the place here in Hawaii. Art's post, Contagious Health, makes the case that this may actually do more harm than good:

Every time we speak, we release a mist of bacteria from our lungs, mouth and GI tract. These bacteria are on our skin, clothes and personal items, and provide a source of the bacteria that make us healthy. Parents and older siblings pass these bacteria on to younger children. These donated bacteria are essential for the development of a healthy immune system and children growing up with healthy relatives and exposed to soil bacteria via pets, farm animals, etc. are healthier than children who are more isolated.

In this sense, hygiene is unhealthy, because an individual is isolated from new sources of bacteria that could replace those lost by limited diets, antibiotics, etc. Otherwise, health is contagious, since gut bacteria from healthy individuals can spread among the population. Washing hands and food is unnatural and unhealthy.

Think of it this way - the vast majority of people you interact with at any given moment, are normally healthy and not suffering from some contagious disease...which means they most likely are exuding healthy bacteria in their exhalations. Fanatically washing your hands and wiping down all your surfaces after every interaction out of the misguided notion that you're keeping yourself healthy may actually harm you more than help.

As Art writes: "Few Bacteria Make You Sick, but Many Are Essential for Good Health".

Now granted, if you encounter someone who is obviously sick, some caution and avoiding exposure to their germs is certainly warranted.

But Dr. Ayers also offers a good piece of advice that is sort of buried in his post...for those who suffer from 'lactose intolerance' it has nothing to do with your "genes" -- many Asian folks mistakenly believe that Asian "genes" are the reason why they have trouble with dairy -- but the kind of bacteria that lives in your gut!

Food intolerance can result from “good” family hygiene, limited diets and exposure to antibiotics. A common intolerance results from the absence of bacteria that produce an enzyme to digest dairy lactose, i.e. lactose intolerance. Lactose intolerance can be readily cured by eating a dairy product, such as yogurt, that contains both lactose and live bacteria (probiotics) that can digest the lactose. Simply eating moderate amounts of live yogurt daily for a couple of weeks resupplies the gut flora with bacteria that can digest lactose, and the intolerance is gone.

Nancy's Organic Whole Milk is my favorite yogurt. I've never had problems with lactose intolerance, but I found that since I began eating this stuff regularly, I have had zero digestive problems for quite some time now.

But it's not just issues with digesting dairy either.

Soluble Fibers Are Plant Polysaccharides that Are Digestible by Bacterial Enzymes
Humans only produce enzymes to digest one polysaccharide, starch. All of the other hundreds of polysaccharides present in plants are only digestible by bacterial (and fungal) enzymes of the gut flora. If the bacteria and enzymes needed to fully digest a particular food polysaccharide are absent, then digestive problems ensue and the polysaccharide can act as a laxative. Continual eating of the problem food with a new source of diverse bacteria, e.g. lightly rinsed vegetables right from the garden, then the gut flora will incorporate new bacteria that can digest the problem polysaccharide and the gut is happy.

Soluble fiber feeds the gut bacteria that convert it into short chain fatty acids that nourish the colon. Constipation results from the absence of the bacteria needed to digest dietary fiber and to produce the large volume of bacteria that make up well hydrated stools.

This MAY be the root cause of any so-called food allergies you may have...it's not that your allergic to the food itself, per say, you just don't have the right gut bacteria to digest it.

Another issue may be a recent use of antibiotics prescribed by your doctor. You may find after having gone through a course of treatments that you have problems digesting foods you never used to have problems with:

Antibiotics have dramatic and lasting impact on gut flora. Cattle treated with antibiotics and a high carbohydrate diet have an altered metabolism (obesity) that leads to rapid fat accumulation in their tissues. This is good for making tasty beef, but the same approach in people produces the suite of diseases in affluent societies.

Children treated with an antibiotic for a simple ear infection, are much more likely to return to pediatricians for treatments of subsequent obesity, infections and diseases. Compromised gut flora can take years to return to normal function after antibiotic treatment. Loss of the appendix, which is the normal source of bacteria to replenish gut flora after diarrhea, results in an increased risk of abnormal gut flora and numerous autoimmune diseases. It is likely that most autoimmune diseases are preceded by prior treatment with antibiotics that disrupted normal gut flora and permanently altered the immune system.

I first really noticed this with my hunting dogs. Occasionally a wild boar can injure or kill a hunting hound with it's sharp, ivory tusks. I've had several dogs killed...and most eventually get injured and cut up pretty good. In some cases, I've had to sew up my own dogs wounds and administer antibiotics for days to prevent the wounds from getting infected. After a course of antibiotics, the dog would usually have bad diarrhea. My veterinarian recommended I feed the dog whole milk yogurt for a week after the antibiotic treatment was done, and sure enough, it worked like a charm.

So the last time I had to take antibiotics for a bad chest infection I had, I began eating the whole milk yogurt as well. Since that time, I've made it a regular part of my diet...along with other probiotic rich foods like sauerkraut, kim chee, cultured cheeses and poi. Perhaps it's mere coincidence...but since than, I've yet to get sick enough to require a Doctor visit and another prescription of antibiotics.